FoodNet is an active laboratory and
population-based surveillance system to monitor the incidence of foodborne
diseases and to conduct epidemiologic studies designed to help public health
officials better understand the epidemiology of foodborne diseases of public
health importance in the United States.

Objectives are to:

Determine the burden of foodborne illness in the United States

Monitor trends in the burden of specific foodborne illness over time

Attribute the burden of foodborne illness to specific foods and settings

Disseminate information that can lead to improvements in public health practice and the development of interventions to reduce the burden of foodborne illness

Population survey - conducted to more precisely
estimate the burden of acute diarrheal illness and to describe the frequency.

Survey of clinical laboratory practices - conducted to determine which
pathogens are included in routine bacterial stool cultures, which tests must be
specifically requested by the physician, and which specific techniques are used
to identify the pathogens.

Physician survey – conducted periodically to
understand current knowledge, attitudes, and practices of physicians within the
surveillance area. Identification of a case of infection with a pathogen
transmitted commonly through food depends upon accurate diagnosis by a
healthcare provider and on appropriate laboratory testing.

Special studies – designed to determine what specific exposure
caused a person with a sporadic infection to become ill. Although foodborne
outbreaks are common, approximately 95% of foodborne infections occur as
sporadic (non-outbreak) cases. Risk factors for sporadic infection can be
explored through population-based studies. FoodNet conducts studies to examine
the importance of various possible risky exposures (such as specific foods) and
practices (such as food preparation and handling practices) as contributors to
illness caused by specific pathogens.

FoodNet’s major contributions include:

the establishment of reliable, active population-based surveillance of enteric diseases;

development and implementation of epidemiologic studies to determine risk and protective factors for enteric infections;

population surveys that describe the features of gastrointestinal illnesses, medical care-seeking behavior, and food eating patterns;

laboratory surveys of current practices; and

development of a surveillance and research platform that can be adapted to address emerging issues.

The most up-to-date information for
diseases under surveillance by FoodNet is found on the CDC website:

The FoodNet FastDashboard is an interactive tool to display data on graphs, maps, and tables for select pathogens transmitted commonly through food. With FoodNet Fast, you can create custom searches and download data from the Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet), which covers about 15% of the United States population including the State of Connecticut. Features on the interactive dashboard allow searches by pathogen, year, age group, sex, and race. FoodNet Fast also provides information on seasonality, hospitalizations, deaths, international travel-associated cases, and outbreak-associated cases. FoodNet Fast currently includes data on confirmed cases from 1996-2015.

The NARMS Now: Human Data Dashboard, is an interactive tool from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that contains antibiotic resistance data from bacteria isolated from humans as part of the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS). This dashboard makes it easier to find changes in antibiotic resistance over the past 17 years for Campylobacter, Escherichia coli O157, Salmonella, and Shigella. Data are currently available for years 1999-2014 and can be displayed as maps, graphs, and tables for these pathogens by serotype and antibiotic.